Sacred and Profane Love eBook

III

‘You think I am happy,’ said Diaz, gazing
at me with a smile suddenly grave; ’but I am
not. I seek something which I cannot find.
And my playing is only a relief from the fruitless
search; only that. I am forlorn.’

‘You!’ I exclaimed, and my eyes rested
on his, long.

Yes, we had met. Perhaps it had been inevitable
since the beginning of time that we should meet; but
it was none the less amazing. Perhaps I had inwardly
known that we should meet; but, none the less, I was
astounded when a coated and muffled figure came up
swiftly to me in the emptying foyer, and said:
’Ah! you are here! I cannot leave without
thanking you for your sympathy. I have never
before felt such sympathy while playing.’
It was a golden voice, pitched low, and the words were
uttered with a very slight foreign accent, which gave
them piquancy. I could not reply; something rose
in my throat, and the caressing voice continued:
’You are pale. Do you feel ill? What
can I do? Come with me to the artists’ room;
my secretary is there.’ I put out a hand
gropingly, for I could not see clearly, and I thought
I should reel and fall. It touched his shoulder.
He took my arm, and we went; no one had noticed us,
and I had not spoken a word. In the room to which
he guided me, through a long and sombre corridor,
there was no sign of a secretary. I drank some
water. ’There, you are better!’ he
cried. ‘Thank you,’ I said, but scarcely
whispering. ’How fortunate I ventured to
come to you just at that moment! You might have
fallen’; and he smiled again. I shook my
head. I said: ’It was your coming—­that—­that—­made
me dizzy!’ ‘I profoundly regret—­’
he began. ‘No, no,’ I interrupted
him; and in that instant I knew I was about to say
something which society would, justifiably, deem unpardonable
in a girl situated as I was. ‘I am so glad
you came’; and I smiled, courageous and encouraging.
For once in my life—­for the first time in
my adult life—­I determined to be my honest
self to another. ’Your voice is exquisitely
beautiful,’ he murmured. I thrilled.

Of what use to chronicle the steps, now halting, now
only too hasty, by which our intimacy progressed in
that gaunt and echoing room? He asked me no questions
as to my identity. He just said that he would
like to play to me in private if that would give me
pleasure, and that possibly I could spare an hour
and would go with him.... Afterwards his brougham
would be at my disposal. His tone was the perfection
of deferential courtesy. Once the secretary came
in—­a young man rather like himself—­and
they talked together in a foreign language that was
not French nor German; then the secretary bowed and
retired.... We were alone.... There can
be no sort of doubt that unless I was prepared to
flout the wisdom of the ages, I ought to have refused
his suggestion. But is not the wisdom of the
ages a medicine for majorities? And, indeed, I